


I See Your History

by sarkywoman



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Drug Use, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-23
Updated: 2020-05-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:54:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24329860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarkywoman/pseuds/sarkywoman
Summary: They were sick of being passive observers of their own lives.For the 'Forced to Watch' square at badthingshappenbingo on tumblr. Klaus looks at the Academy and sees it makes no sense.
Relationships: Diego Hargreeves/Klaus Hargreeves
Comments: 12
Kudos: 71
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo





	I See Your History

**Author's Note:**

  * For [stabbyumbrella](https://archiveofourown.org/users/stabbyumbrella/gifts).



> Happy Birthday stabbyumbrella!

Klaus wonders what Vanya sees when she watches them. When they don their uniforms and domino masks and step out to face ‘evil’. Does she see the inverted commas on it? Klaus never used to. He did as he was told. He saw what he was told to see. 

He doesn’t anymore. Perhaps it’s the drugs. He’s been told they open your mind and certainly his has been realigned a few times now. Sometimes he wonders if things make more or less sense now. If he makes more or less sense now. Something is out of sync. He’s either confused or the world is confused. Kids with powers in masks fighting art thieves. Ghosts screaming for the attention of a thirteen-year-old boy. A man who says they will save the world when they can’t even save themselves. A sound, a shove, a fall, then Diego’s blood all over the floor. All over Diego’s chest and Klaus’ hands. He calls for Grace but she doesn’t appear. He doesn’t know what happened, just keeps his hands to the hole that’s opening red until Luther is lifting Diego away and Ben is asking, “why didn’t you call for first aid?” Klaus can’t answer. “You’re high, aren’t you?”

They’re not in the house. They’re on a mission. Five appears out of nowhere. “I got the bastard. Sniper on the roof south-west. That’s all of them.” Klaus doesn’t know why he’s there. It doesn’t make any sense. He sees the dead and with his last dose, not even that. Klaus doesn’t know why any of them are there. It doesn’t make any sense. They’re all children. Who is shooting at children? Someone was shooting at him. The sound had been Diego calling his name. It filters through now, tardy, as Allison guides him into the back of the car. 

Time is complicated. The drive takes forever. His whole life becomes the moments between Diego’s pained breaths. Everything Klaus knows is the strong squeeze of Diego’s hand when Klaus takes hold of it. Everything he needed to see is in Diego’s dark eyes. Klaus understands everything and nothing all at once. The world after the car is a harried affair, rushing to the lab so a robot and a monkey can stitch Diego’s guts in. There is enough panic that they let him stay. Klaus watches. If he leaves the world will end.

His father summons him. The world doesn’t end. It just mutes. His father’s lips move and there’s a faint tone, like the high-pitched tone of a television turning off. Klaus pretends it’s words. When he is dismissed he goes to the bar and fetches a bottle before resuming his vigil at Diego’s bedside.

*

It’s going to rain, Klaus thinks as he blows smoke at the sky. It’s going to pour down with rain and not one of them have an umbrella. The Umbrella Academy. That’s hilarious. An unwilling umbrella to protect the world from a deluge of bullshit. 

“Number Four! Extinguish your cigarette this instant!” Klaus does so with a sigh. He had found it in his pocket while rummaging for some gum and had forgotten why he couldn’t. “Front and centre! Now!” He couldn’t smoke because they’re in the middle of training. Outdoors today, for a bit of fresh air. The obstacle course in the graveyard. Courtyard. Whatever. There were ghosts everywhere. His hit before breakfast wasn’t strong enough. They rarely are anymore. Maybe the ghosts are getting stronger as he ages. A terrifying thought, even though his feelings are very far away. Perceptible, like something in a telescope, but not tangible. It’s like meditating. He observes the feelings. And his father is shouting again.

With another sigh Klaus makes his way to the course. Shuffles his way tiredly through it, knocking over obstacles and making no effort for speed. Allison chuckles but quickly smothers the sound. When Klaus meets Diego’s gaze though, he sees he’s frowning. Not as deep as dad or Luther, but frowning nonetheless. Klaus doesn’t even finish the course before his father calls him back. “A truly deplorable lack of respect for this Academy, forcing everyone to watch that miserable display. Number Two!” Diego snaps to attention. “Demonstrate how it should be done.” Luther tries to offer to exhibit his skills, but their father insists on it being Diego. For some reason, Diego takes it seriously. Klaus can’t understand. He watches Diego jump and twist and lunge and wonders what his father thinks he sees.

He wonders what Diego sees in all this. Something useful, somehow. Something noble? Something worthy of his time and energy. Something worth dying for? Their father says they’re going to save the world. He doesn’t say how, or why, or what it will cost. Everything he’s done has been to prepare them. If this is all the rehearsal, Klaus doesn’t fancy attending the main event.

He looks up to the sky as a raindrop hits his nose. There it is. “Pay attention Number Four! Surely you have seen rain before.” Klaus turns his focus back to the course, where Diego is ascending a rope with a knife held in his teeth. Like a pirate. Klaus giggles at the thought. “I am glad you find this amusing, Number Four. You will be running this course for two full hours once the others have completed it.”

No, he won’t. Klaus is starting to see what Five had seen and it’s beautiful and scary. Their father can’t make them do anything. He can order Luther to hold Klaus’ head in place and watch Diego then Allison then Ben complete the obstacle course, but he won’t order Luther to bend each of Klaus’ limbs to move him through the course. They are all probably expendable, but Reginald Hargreeves won’t kill them. Klaus won’t die from disobedience. Why can’t any of them see that? Five was a genius, that’s how he knew. Klaus doesn’t fancy himself as one, so what is the common thread? Vanya stands up at the window looking down at them as Diego finishes the course. Does she see it too? From a different angle?

*

“Where are you going?” Ben asks as Klaus flings things at random into a couple of rucksacks. “Are you seriously leaving?” Klaus doesn’t reply. He thinks it’s fairly obvious. Who can stay, really? He’s sixteen years old and all of the time he has lived his own life probably doesn’t add up to one single day. He has been a soldier. A tool. An observer of injustice who never moved to stop it.

“Did you at least talk to Diego? You know how he worries. I mean, I’m not really willing to abandon the Academy but he might go with you,” Ben suggests, still in his clothes from the last mission though Klaus has changed into more comfortable clothes. Tight pants that his dad said made him look ‘like a lady of the night’ and a loose tye-dye shirt that dad said made him look ‘like an intoxicated hippy’. He’d happily sit somewhere between the two.

“No, he won’t,” Klaus says. He throws his little box of petty cash in a bag and notices a pill beneath that he scoops up and pops in his mouth. Yum. A pleasant surprise from the disorganised past. “Diego’s staying. Even after what we saw. I can’t… I can’t watch anymore. I can’t sit around this fucking house and… it’s like bleeding dry. Ben, if I stay I’m gonna slit my fucking wrists. Do you get that?” He’s already overdosed, woken up in the lab with Diego stoically clutching his hand. 

“You’re overreacting,” Ben says. “You always do.” He thinks. “Or underreact. I guess it depends what drugs you’re on. I know life here isn’t easy. I mean come on, it’s my life too. All of ours. You think I don’t… want more? Sometimes? But we’re part of something bigger, for all that Allison keeps talking about leaving. I wish you’d stay.” Klaus shakes his head, his stomach sinking with every word. He’s seen enough. Diego hasn’t, Allison hasn’t yet, Luther probably won’t ever, Vanya… who fucking knows. And Ben. Oh, Ben. Looking at him with miserable confusion and asking, “what?” Klaus zips up his bags and goes to hug him. But his arms go straight through, to Ben’s absolute horror.

*

Diego sees it in his mind’s eye every night. Klaus creeping into his room and whispering, “I’m leaving. Come with me?” Diego had thought it a drugged up whim, unlikely to reach fruition. Klaus was always full of insanity when he was high, which gradually became all the time. He had even kissed Diego once, when playing around in women’s clothes. Though that too had become more frequent. Klaus grew out of social norms at the rate other people grew out of childhood phases.

He had apparently grown out of needing anyone too. When Diego said no, Klaus had gotten so close, close enough that another kiss seemed on the horizon. “Don’t you see this place for what it is yet?” Diego had shaken his head. It was grief talking, that was all. Ben’s loss had shaken them all. Diego had hoped, secretly, that Klaus might come to him. That he would come to him for comfort and strength and in doing so, unwittingly be what Diego needed. An outlet for the need to do _something_. He had failed Ben. But it wasn’t a bullet he could jump in front of, as he’d done for Klaus years ago. He and Klaus and all of them had to watch as Ben… tore apart.

They were supposed to hold together, Luther always said. That night Diego had wanted him to be right. He had wanted to seek solace in the sweet smoky scent of Klaus’ curls. He had been ready to hold him. To try his hand at something softer than a knife. But maybe that was just grief talking too. Diego had ignored his feelings for long enough before that. He called it concern. Protectiveness. Camaraderie. Shared trauma. The natural consequence of social isolation with a beautiful boy who kept flirting with him before Diego had even realised what flirting was. Diego hadn’t failed Klaus as badly as he’d failed Ben, but he wished he had covered his eyes. Klaus already saw too much.

And he left. While the rest of them tried to come to terms with what had happened, while they tried to figure out what happened next, Klaus made the first serious decision of his life. And he had asked Diego to go with him. For all that Diego wanted to be needed, he couldn’t figure out what Klaus needed him _for_. Diego was against his drug use and it was already clear that Klaus could get his rocks off with other people. 

Another moment Diego relives that he wishes he could scrub from his mind. The sounds from Klaus’ room. Diego sneaking in with a knife in hand, ready to protect him if it was more than a night terror. Standing in the doorway with wide eyes as he took in the sight of Klaus’ pale body in the moonlight through the window, writhing beneath a man Diego didn’t know. The sounds were sounds of pleasure. Of need. And Diego couldn’t leave. Everything in him screamed at the thought of leaving Klaus alone with an unknown. It went against every instinct he had. So he had watched as the two rubbed together. As Klaus came with a soft cry and looked towards Diego.

It was too dark to know if he saw before Diego left. When Klaus came to him that later night, after the loss of Ben, Diego had assumed it was protection he wanted. Klaus had not been a fighter for a long time. Diego had stopped bothering to be disappointed in him for that. But Klaus clearly wanted protection on his travels. Protection from his dealers, from his lovers, from himself… What else could he have wanted? 

*

It’s not how Diego imagined. It might be what he wanted. He’s not sure. Years have passed, expectations had faded. Now he has Klaus against the brick wall outside some shitty club. Their bodies move together in ways they learned from other people. Diego bites. Klaus scratches. It’s not sweet but it’s hungry. Klaus is beautiful as a feral, needy thing and Diego understands what he wants.

He had seen it, tailing a gang leader he planned to put out of business, only to see his Klaus getting on his knees. Klaus called it an investment, sucking dick for a drug baron. Diego called it suicide and wanton self-destruction. Klaus had smiled dangerously. “Didn’t stop you watching...” And that was that. Diego had grabbed him not knowing what came next and Klaus had kissed him. 

“I had to,” Diego says between grunts of pleasure as he fucks Klaus up against the wall. “Don’t you fucking get it? I had to watch. I always have to watch you. I don’t know what else to--” Klaus kisses him again and Diego closes his eyes. Feels him instead. Holds him. Loves him.

“Saw this coming,” Klaus whispers. “Thought I was dreaming.” As if a dirty alleyway was a honeymoon suite to him. As if Diego is Prince Charming, sweeping him off his feet, not fucking him against a wall. “Do you see it, Dee?” Another kiss. “We make sense.” Klaus has never made sense one day in his life, but Diego isn’t cruel enough to say so now. He doesn’t see what Klaus sees, but what he sees is gorgeous nonetheless. 

*

Diego works the knots against each other where they sit snug on his wrists. They’re rough material and he already has friction burns for his efforts. But he doesn’t stop, because his efforts are not enough. A fist slams into his cheek. Another tooth dislodged. The pain blooms hot and doesn’t go away. He carries on working at his binds. If he can get enough leverage, he might be able to pop his thumbs out. He can hold knives between his fingers without the use of his thumbs. That’s what training was for. Well. Maybe not. But it’s what he uses it for, destroying dangerous thugs like this. Saving lives, baby. God he hopes so. 

“Still not talking, huh?” The bastard grins. “That’s fine. Let’s go back to this one.” Diego says nothing as the man crosses over to Klaus’ chair. Klaus was high as a kite when they brought him in and he’s done nothing but swear at them. It’s making them angry, which is making Diego nervous. This is all his fault. He’s killed two of this dude’s men. He hasn’t been careful. He swore no attachments, but that had never been something he could truthfully swear.

Klaus has blood on his teeth when he smiles. “We’ve been trained for this, you know,” he says cheerfully after the bastard has backhanded him twice. “Remember, Dee? When Dad played that game?” The bastard tells him to shut up. Hits him again. Diego tries to get a hand free. Klaus laughs. “Our dad did this thing. One at a time. We’d be locked in a room. He’d tell us that in order to save most of our siblings we had to push this big red button, but that would kill one of them.” He laughs, even though there’s nothing funny about it at all. Diego’s stomach flipped. “I wasn’t paying attention. I was high. I pushed the button and he let me out and I only found out what the game was later.” Another slap that Klaus shrugs off, though he looks a little dizzy from the impact. “Point is, we were trained not to worry about each other.”

The bastard balls his hand into a fist and punches Klaus out. He nods as Klaus sags in the chair, nose and lip bloody. “Finally shut him the fuck up,” he says proudly. He doesn’t hear the click of Diego’s thumbs over his own voice. As he turns back to Diego he says, “maybe now you’ll understand that--” Diego tackles him to the ground before he’s finished, headbutts him, crushing his nose flat. With his thumbs still wrecked Diego can’t punch him, so he presses down with his arm across the bastard’s neck. He flails, but he shouldn’t have sent his buddies away, because he’s all alone here. And Diego is _furious_. “You shouldn’t have made me watch that.” The last thing the guy hears. Diego doesn’t linger after that. He manages to get his thumbs into good enough shape that he can unfasten Klaus and carry him out. Klaus is unconscious for a while. He doesn’t hear Diego confess that he had never passed that test in their youth. 

*

“I’ve always watched you,” he murmurs, his fingers cording through Klaus’ curls. “Guess you never noticed.” Klaus shakes his head slowly. “I worried about you since I can remember. Loved you since I can remember. If I stopped watching you… you’d overdose. Or fuck a stranger. Or just disappear. It killed me when you left.”

“You should have come with me then,” Klaus says. He walks his fingers up Diego’s chest, which he’s using as a pillow. He loves getting to look at Diego’s naked glory. The showers post-training were where Klaus first figured out he might like men and Diego has improved a _lot_ since then. “You could have watched all you wanted.” But that was always the problem, wasn’t it? They were sick of being passive observers of their own lives. Klaus might not be able to steer for shit, but he was still happier in the driving wheel than as a passenger. Diego had needed a chance to do the same. They never would have managed together. Not back then. Not without growing up, fucked up as they’ve become. 

“You’re sickening,” says Ben from where he sits by the door reading. “I can’t believe you make me watch this shit.” Klaus just smiles. He won’t respond while Diego’s there, just in case it makes him start feeling selfconscious. Besides, they both know he doesn’t _make_ Ben watch anything. Ben chooses to visit to watch his loved ones pick up the love they found long ago, dust it off and run with it. 

*

Klaus no longer has to watch Diego jump through literal hoops for a man who doesn’t even acknowledge them enough to despise them. No longer has to watch him struggle against his fear and pain in a chair while ink is drawn into his arm. He doesn’t have to watch Diego push down all his softness until it’s a secret self because he has to be a badass for a monster. He doesn’t have to watch arduous training sessions that end in blood. He doesn’t have to watch Diego fall to the ground in front of him with a bullet wound, doesn’t have to watch him rush his own healing in a desperate attempt to be battle-ready and strong again.

He gets to see Diego smile. Gets to watch him order a good breakfast for both of them at the diner. Some days they go for a walk in the park, just a regular couple enjoying the sunshine with their hands in one another’s. He gets to watch Diego fight for fun, showing off in the boxing ring. Exploiting the gifts they were born with in a way that would make their father spin in his well-earned grave. 

It’s not always a pretty picture. Diego still pushes himself too hard, doesn’t know his own limits. He’ll take on any fight he finds and he goes looking for them. He rejected their father’s grand purpose and developed one of his own that’s just as selfless and reckless. Klaus has never been bad at first aid, but he develops the skill in earnest to ensure he can keep stitching up his darling vigilante. He’s forced to watch Diego stagger home bloody far too often. Klaus spends a lot of evenings pressing frozen veg to Diego’s bruises.

“You gotta pick less battles, Dee,” Klaus says gently, wiping blood from his split brow. “A few scars is hot but you’re gonna be more scar than man soon.” He’d still be gorgeous, of course. His violence comes from caring too much and that will never stop being attractive. “Just… promise you’ll always come home to me? It wouldn’t be the same, having your ghost.” Diego kisses him and makes a promise he can’t keep.

*

Diego no longer has to watch Klaus go screaming to his secret training. No longer has to watch him stare at their father with hollow eyes empty of anything approaching emotion. He doesn’t have to watch his ‘brother’ fumble through pointless training sessions with deliberate discombobulation. He doesn’t have to watch Klaus meander through missions with his guard perpetually down, a target for any shithead wanting to score against the Umbrella Academy. He doesn’t have to watch him take strangers to bed in an attempt to feel something or to get more drugs. He doesn’t have to watch him cut his arms in a fit of frustrated malaise. 

He gets to watch Klaus paint. Gets to see him dance like nobody’s watching. (There are dances he gets where Klaus is _determined_ that Diego’s watching, but those are a whole different deal.) He gets to take Klaus to charity shops and watch him pick out the most insane clothes and somehow still look beautiful. He gets to try Klaus’ attempts at cooking, for better or for worse. He gets to come home to him, to lay in his arms and kiss him and make love to him then wake up with him in the morning. Well, watch him sleep in while Diego wakes up in the morning.

It’s not always a pretty picture. Klaus isn’t giving up the drugs. _Can’t_ give up the drugs. They’ve tried. Diego had been a little naive about how easy it would be, but Klaus’ addiction was even worse than a regular one. Normal addicts didn’t have to worry about ghost manifestation during withdrawal. Diego had to back down or risk losing him entirely. If he tries to withhold drugs, Klaus goes out looking for them and pays with whatever he has – their limited funds, Diego’s possessions, his body… Even accepting the chemical abuse, there’s no way to make it safe. Twice now Diego has found him on the floor unresponsive. Two trips to the hospital, escaping before they could be billed. Even when it’s not full-blown overdose, Klaus has a tendency to emotionally check out when he’s high that leaves Diego feeling alone. 

“You gotta stop trying to check out on me,” he says, soothing Klaus through a nasty come-down from some dodgy dose. “I know you’ve got it rough. I know. But I can’t do this without you. You get me?” Klaus nods slowly, doe eyes sad and big amidst the tear-smudged eyeliner. “Don’t make me watch you die. I couldn’t… I couldn’t live with myself if I failed you.” Klaus squeezes his hand. Says he’ll try to cut down. It won’t last, of course, but it’s a pretty thought. 

They’ll just have to watch over one another. Live and wait and watch how it turns out.


End file.
